Nobody has asked me my opinion on this, but that’s never stopped me from offering it.
As the COVID-19 pandemic drags on, I have started to do a few more things, like shopping in person rather than online.
I detest the news of retailers closing down. It literally makes me sick. I am sad for the employees, the owners and for us, the customers.
It's like watching society disintegrate.
Shopping, for me, was not only a necessity, but a recreational sport. I’m not sure it can or will or even should go back to that, but in any case, I always looked forward to retail therapy.
It was something I always did with my family with weekly trips to Eatons, Sears, Hudson’s Bay and the like. I was a shopper from the time I learned to walk. (As I recall, I was put on a leash to keep me in control and yes, they used to do that. And no, it didn’t scar me!)
I always enjoyed a shopping trip with friends in Canada and in the United States. They were like mini vacations, a getaway from the everyday, as they say.
While many enjoy daily deliveries of goods to their front step, it is just not really my thing.
I want to touch the stuff (although, we can’t do that now) and smell the newness of the goods. I enjoyed seeing the newest shipments of clothes as each season approached.
I liked the experience of freedom as I meandered down the store aisles with my shopping cart. There would be nothing on my mind other than the next possible bargain.
Anyway, the point is I loved to shop.
I don’t love it any longer. It's another chore.
I have a few suggestions for retailers to make things more inviting.
Turn the air conditioning on full blast.
I understand I am perhaps speaking more for your customers of the female middle-aged persuasion, but most stores are just too hot... frozen food section not included. It’s a hot summer and add on the necessity of the face mask and it becomes unbearable. I literally stand in socially distant lines waiting for a cashier and I can feel the sweat dripping off my hair and onto my shirt. My mask is drenched. It is nausea-inducing. Please keep us cool literally and figuratively.
Keep your employee levels up.
This is the time to up your game for customer service, not lower it. If you don’t want too many people in the store then you can avoid bunching up at the tills by having enough cashiers on. Get us in and get us out. I know I am taking mental notes on which stores have their procedures down pat. I’ll reward them with my business now and into the future. Any place not making my life more difficult gets my appreciation.
Promote kindness.
To be honest, 95 per cent of my experiences have been positive. Employees have been super friendly. Workers and customers have been working together to follow the rules and take care of business. However, I had two very different experiences in the same week.
In one case, I'm assuming because we all look alike in a mask, I had a store employee greet me warmly three times. Every time I rounded a different aisle and we met up I got a very cordial greeting and exchanged a few words. It made me smile.
Contrast that to being in a drive-thru where the attendant nearly bit my head off.
I swear this was the conversation:
Me: “Hi. How are you tonight?”
(Silence)
Me: “So, can I get a cheeseburger with nothing on it?”
Him: “That’ll be five minutes.” (Insert growly mean voice here)
Me: “That’s fine.” (Insert Mary Poppins-ish voice here)
Me: “Can I also get an order of fish and chips?”
Him: “Grrrr...That’’ll be seven minutes."
Me: “That’s no problem.”
Next thing I knew, there was a plastic kitchen basin on a stick shoved into my face for payment.
Him: “Drive over there, I’ll bring it out.”
His over-the-top anger struck me as hilarious and I laughed for the whole 12 minutes of waiting.
I do think he growled “have a nice night” before storming off with a stick up his behind.
That just made it all the more comical.
But, really, people, we are all hot and broke and scared and overworked and underpaid. Being a total jerk doesn’t make anything better.
I believe retailers really need our business. I want to give it to them.
Let’s make a deal: you make my experience pleasant and I will follow the arrows and follow your instructions.
I will have a mask on, but I promise I will be smiling.
